Unhealthy interest in sales figures

[Vault Dweller]

Website and magazine ads are not very cost effective. I believe Charles-cgr tried on on RPS and didn't have good results.

Maybe he should have tried IGN then . Or bribe kingcomrade TotalBiscuit. In all seriousness though, in your opinion what would be the most efficient way to advertise it? Steam ads?

The best way would be to hire an agency that can get us previews and impressions we can't get on our own. These days even asking a game reviewer to review your game is asking too much.

Basically, nobody wants to write shit that nobody wants to read (i.e. cover a game like AoD or Underrail or Serpent), unless it's a special favor. They want to write shit that people do want to read about (like Fallout 4). For the record, I'm not bitter or upset about it, that's just how things are. High profile games increase readership, readership increases ad revenues, everyone's happy. The media/publishing business is all about connections and we don't have any. So the best course of action is to hire people who do.

 

[Haba]

Hey, I can even recommend you a PR agency...

Spoiler

 

[tuluse]

Website and magazine ads are not very cost effective. I believe Charles-cgr tried on on RPS and didn't have good results.

Maybe he should have tried IGN then . Or bribe kingcomrade TotalBiscuit. In all seriousness though, in your opinion what would be the most efficient way to advertise it? Steam ads?

If Irontower had money to spend on advertizing, I would advise them to not to and instead to contract out more art to make pretty screenshots.

I'd focus on turning people who see the AoD steam store page into sales. If they're looking through at you store page that means they're already expressing some level of interesting even if it's just liking rpgs/cool name/whatever, so I'd focus on that.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Website and magazine ads are not very cost effective. I believe Charles-cgr tried on on RPS and didn't have good results.

Maybe he should have tried IGN then . Or bribe kingcomrade TotalBiscuit. In all seriousness though, in your opinion what would be the most efficient way to advertise it? Steam ads?

If Irontower had money to spend on advertizing, I would advise them to not to and instead to contract out more art to make pretty screenshots.

I'd focus on turning people who see the AoD steam store page into sales. If they're looking through at you store page that means they're already expressing some level of interesting even if it's just liking rpgs/cool name/whatever, so I'd focus on that.

I think the issue is that not enough potential buyers are aware that the game exists. In general, as a former marketing guy, I can tell you that there are two kinds of businesses: those that advertise and grow and those that don't and struggle for years or wither and die. No matter how awesome you think your product is, if nobody knows about it, it doesn't exist and unless it's something truly revolutionary, the word of mouth isn't enough to survive.

Of course, there are right and wrong (the ratio is 1 to 10, so it's painfully easy to waste a lot of money and get nothing) ways to advertise and since it's a new industry for me, I have no idea which is which yet.

 

[tuluse]

I think the issue is that not enough potential buyers are aware that the game exists. In general, as a former marketing guy, I can tell you that there are two kinds of businesses: those that advertise and grow and those that don't and struggle for years or wither and die. No matter how awesome you think your product is, if nobody knows about it, it doesn't exist and unless it's something truly revolutionary, the word of mouth isn't enough to survive.

Of course, there are right and wrong (the ratio is 1 to 10, so it's painfully easy to waste a lot of money and get nothing) ways to advertise and since it's a new industry for me, I have no idea which is which yet.

Well, I don't see how you could pump money into anything and get a return unless you're a AAA and buying TV spots and just flooding people's attention.

I do agree marketing is important, but getting review/previews/impressions articles written about the game isn't something that throwing money at the problem will help.

I suppose you could hire someone to just post about how it awesome it is on various internet boards like neogaf, reddit, etc.

 

[felipepepe]

One uphill battle is that dialogs and C&C are not easy to advertise. Not unless you have AAA graphics and voiced dialogs, that is...

 

[tuluse]

One uphill battle is that dialogs and C&C are not easy to advertise. Not unless you have AAA graphics and voiced dialogs, that is...

I don't think this is true actually. The difficulty curve is hard, but c&c seems really easy to sell to me. I mean just read some Fargo quotes.

"no two players have the same experience"
"the most reactive game of all time!!!11"
"tough decisions with real consequences"

With AoD, I can even think of things like

"everyone has their own story, what will yours be"


I remember I when I used to browse 4chan, there were posts that seemed awfully like viral marketing for Mount and Blade and Tropico, where people would just write mini-lps showing off various combinations/things you could do and made them seem really cool. This is trickier with AoD if you won't want to spoil the story though.

 

[felipepepe]

Sure, they are easy to talk about, but not to show in an ad or trailer.

One idea I had when talking with Elhoim about the trailer was to do very short "mini-playthroughs", like a montage of the choices a mercenary makes until dying in the arena, then a loremaster helping to reactivate that weird machine, a thief sneaking into the palace and getting caught, etc... Problem with that is it's very spoiler-ish, and you still have to get people to find & watch the fucking videos.

 

[Vault Dweller]

I think the issue is that not enough potential buyers are aware that the game exists. In general, as a former marketing guy, I can tell you that there are two kinds of businesses: those that advertise and grow and those that don't and struggle for years or wither and die. No matter how awesome you think your product is, if nobody knows about it, it doesn't exist and unless it's something truly revolutionary, the word of mouth isn't enough to survive.

Of course, there are right and wrong (the ratio is 1 to 10, so it's painfully easy to waste a lot of money and get nothing) ways to advertise and since it's a new industry for me, I have no idea which is which yet.

Well, I don't see how you could pump money into anything and get a return unless you're a AAA and buying TV spots and just flooding people's attention.

This worked well:

I do agree marketing is important, but getting review/previews/impressions articles written about the game isn't something that throwing money at the problem will help.

Au contraire. Like I said, you need connections. Basically, you can either submit a game and hope for the best or find the right agency with the right connections that will get your game into the right hands and bump it up on the priority list. I emailed a lot of sites, 9 out of 10 emails are ignored, so it's not something that you can easily do on your own. I did get us some coverage over the years and I was lucky enough to get RPS to cover the game, but that's the best I can do without doing marketing full time.

I suppose you could hire someone to just post about how it awesome it is on various internet boards like neogaf, reddit, etc.

Nah.

 

[tuluse]

I was curious how the master himself, Brian Fargo, trailer'd his story heavy games.





In both torment trailers there is a heavy emphasis on the setting. I could definitely see an AoD trailer that focused on the myths about the war. Hire someone who sounds like Decard Cain or the guy in the Mad Max intros to narrative myths about the great war and story board/comic book style visuals play. Do like 3 of them with different views and maybe even contradictions and use that to tie into the theme of how everyone lies.

I do agree marketing is important, but getting review/previews/impressions articles written about the game isn't something that throwing money at the problem will help.

Au contraire. Like I said, you need connections.

So the plan is to hire Zoe Quinn to tell the journalists she's sleeping with to review AoD?

 

[Cowboy Moment]

Insofar as marketing goes, as you neither have the money to cast a wide net (as in, have ads on IGN or some such), nor would it be cost-effective for you to do so, maybe you should try to narrow down where your potential audience might be congregated. Obviously, you're already on the Codex, I imagine the Watch will review AoD upon launch in any event, but there might be other pockets of interest in a game like yours scattered all over the web, even at places like NeoGAF, SA, and so forth. For example, one Durante consistently puts AoD on his lists of "RPGs to look forward to this year" he puts up at NeoGAF. Might be worthwhile to look around and try to identify these places, if you yet haven't.

On that note, I'd follow the advice of one Sven Vincke, and follow the Youtube chain: think of games similar to yours, search Youtube for videos or LPs of those games with decent viewcounts, take a look at what the channel owner covers in general, and consider sending them a key once you're about to release. Matt Barton is an obvious example, but I'm sure you can find more. For example, I used Wasteland 2 as my "similar game", found an LP by guy named ChrstopherOdd, who plays a lot of popamole/storyfag crap, but also VtMB, Deus Ex, Witcher 1, said Wasteland 2, and doesn't seem allergic to indies without great production values. Maybe it's worth asking if he wants to try AoD out?

In a similar vein, look for reviewer/outlets who are like to give you a fair shake, as opposed to just big websites with lots of traffic.

In general, AoD isn't a bad game for LPs, I think, considering the nonlinearity, relatively short playthroughs, and the ability to get fucked over in hilarious ways. I wonder if it isn't worthwhile to play up the Fuck You factor of AoD in marketing - several other games have done it successfully, and it also sets player expectations at a good level, so they don't come crying to forums when they lose the first fight of the game.

I also think that the story of a middle-aged marketing executive who quit his day job to develop a hardcore niche RPG that will fuck you is really cool, so you might want to try that angle if you're comfortable with it. I know that one interview RPS did with you back in the day, where you all but called all the readers morons, surely turned a few heads.

Take of my uninformed opinions what you will, and good luck.

 

[Ninjerk]

You motherfuckers need vision. Get one of these twitch girls to get dweebs to make competing donations for different choices in the game. EZ

 

[tuluse]

Insofar as marketing goes, as you neither have the money to cast a wide net (as in, have ads on IGN or some such), nor would it be cost-effective for you to do so, maybe you should try to narrow down where your potential audience might be congregated. Obviously, you're already on the Codex, I imagine the Watch will review AoD upon launch in any event, but there might be other pockets of interest in a game like yours scattered all over the web, even at places like NeoGAF, SA, and so forth. For example, one Durante consistently puts AoD on his lists of "RPGs to look forward to this year" he puts up at NeoGAF. Might be worthwhile to look around and try to identify these places, if you yet haven't.

This is what I meant when I said if you had money to hire someone to go to various communities and say the game is awesome, not something underhanded and secret, just what VD is already doing on the codex and ITS forums in more places.

You motherfuckers need vision. Get one of these twitch girls to get dweebs to make competing donations for different choices in the game. EZ

pantsoffgaming girl is love

 

[Charles-cgr]

Website and magazine ads are not very cost effective. I believe Charles-cgr tried on on RPS and didn't have good results.

It isn't entirely worthless but it needs to be part of a plan. Something like opening a thread in their forums, running the ad and directing your new players from said ad towards the new thread. Hope they'll bloat it and increase the attention on RPS. Many indeed have ad blockers but people are also good at simply ignoring ads.

If you advertise on RPS, advertise a sale. They're Steam players. The vast majority will ignore a full price $25 game imo.

I agree with VD that a PR agency is something you need. I contacted one to discuss future launches. But it was a while ago and I can't seem to actually do launches / finish a game lately (damit).

I'm also going to focus on my home market a lot more. There's the Made in France effect going for me and the French market is far from negligible. I got an article in Canard PC without even trying back when UW Gold came out.

 

[mediocrepoet]

I'm also going to focus on my home market a lot more. There's the Made in France effect going for me and the French market is far from negligible. I got an article in Canard PC without even trying back when UW Gold came out.

This could help you out in the rest of the world too: Made in France (but it's good anyway).

 

[Correct_Carlo]

AOD has had quite a bit of coverage on RPS, or at least an amount that I think many indies would kill for (the way the game originally came to RPS' attention was brilliant. RPS basically bashed the game, then were humiliated into making an about face in a spectacular fashion via the interview. I don't think a PR company could have better orchestrated that if it were actively trying.). That's were I first heard of it. Although that's 7 years ago now, so a sizable portion of the gaming population probably isn't even old enough to remember. That said, I might be naive, but I think most people who are heavily into RPGs of its sort probably already know about AOD, or will know about it on release. Or do people think I'm wrong? I feel like people who are into turn based RPGs, would be predisposed to buying an indie one, and are susceptible to word of mouth, reviews, and advertising in making purchasing decisions probably frequent a very, very, small number of internet websites. Are there any of those which haven't referenced AOD in anyway? (I really don't know, which is why I ask).

As to expanding the games sales beyond that niche demographic, I don't think that more casual gamers who might buy the game, even though they aren't predisposed to its genre, would be swayed by adds. But they probably would buy it if a Totalbiscuit or an RPS gave it a really good review on release, which is probably much harder to orchestrate. So it seems like advertising, if done, should focus more on getting people already aware of the game's existence to make the plunge and buy it, which is probably harder to do. I think reviews can do that, but I'm not sure if ads can, unless, as someone up thread suggested, it's advertising a sale.

Had the game been released 5 years ago, though, I do think it probably could have had (relatively) massive cross over appeal to casuals on Steam (kind of like how massive spiderweb games where when they first released on steam, despite zero marketing). But that era's over now that steam is flooded with games and the novelty of owning games on steam for its own sake is dead.

As a side note, the people who made Sunset are idiots and pissed away an opportunity most art game makers would have killed for. They got in on the art game craze way earlier than most other studios, and as a consequence they've always had a notoriety that the quality of their games never deserved simply because they made a name for themselves merely by doing something different at a time when no one else was. Given their notoriety, many gaming magazines who would never review your typical art game would automatically review everything they released. Despite this, though, they never had the financial success of a "Gone Home," a "Dear Esther," or a "Proteus" because, at a fundamental level, their games always sucked (not that those games are great, but they are far more successful at what they were trying to do than anything Tale of Tales ever did). So they pissed away an incredibly advantageous marketing position by just making really shitty games, then blamed marketing for their failure. It's kind of funny that they thought their game would sell merely from an RPS ad, despite the fact that RPS themselves gave the game a really shitty review and it was mostly received with a shrug by most gaming critics (even the ones predisposed to liking art games).

 

[FUDU]

1. Go full release on Steam.
2. Bribe Totalbiscut with 10.000 dollars to say game is best thing ever.
3. ???
4. Profit.


Total mearketing budget ten grand.

 

[t]

1. Go full release on Steam.
2. Bribe Totalbiscut with 10.000 dollars to say game is best thing ever.
3. ???
4. Profit.


Total mearketing budget ten grand.

If only he agreed to be bribed. Unfortunately, he seems particularily disinterested in cRPGs lately, not to mention games that you need to put some time into to learn the ropes. To add insult to injury, he'd probably freak out at the additional mouse acceleration you cannot turn off (Vault Dweller I know there will be time for bugfixes, don't forget about it!); his perfect game is short, has a big emotional impact, runs well and has an extensive options menu.

 

[SniperHF]

Wonder how many Steam refunds will be issued after people die in the first fight 10 times and rage quit.

 

[Goral]

Probably a bad idea but asking shouldn't hurt. Does Steam allow "buy two, get one free" promotions? Maybe that could help improve the sales. 30$ might put people off but with 20$ per copy (if you would pay 60$) people could be more willing to buy it (either to sell additional keys or because friends would do a fund-raising). It would stay in line with IT price policy too. The question is when would be the right time to use such tactic (if ever) and how many copies would be optimal (maybe "buy 3 get one free" would be better for example).

AoD is a niche game so I'm afraid that without proper exposure the sales will drop pretty quickly. Then again, if people who aren't AoD target audience get their hands on it, negative reviews may follow.

 

[Fenix]

Strategic tips.
Russian audience traditionally has strong craving for post-apocalyptic games, so you could easily get 1\3 of all sales from Russia.
So it would be obvious move to put a a substantial part of the effort on that market.
I can recommend Riot Pixels and PGCore (also RPGNuke but it' looks like he's a bit extinct) even though I I don't like those fuckers, and I know you know about them because we talked on one of these.
Can't say anything good about Kanobu, never visited it, looks like usual shitty marketing sites with stupid articles and big pics like "top 10 tits in games", and its visitors are the same, so it's basically not your audience.
Also I strongly advice to have Russian translation on Day 1 - not next week, let alone next month - you need it on Day 1.

As for LP - it's not easy to make good LP on AoD - Pope Amole II said in his, that to make good saturated video on hour, he need 2 hours of preparations, so I belive we don't see many good LP on AoD, sadly.

And it would be good to know what % of sales come from Russan sector after release.

 

[Fenix]

Should adjust something.

even though I don't like those fuckers

This does not apply to RPGNuke.

Also, however even it is true that without doubts Kanobu are Doritos-style jornos, given the fact that Russian audience love post-apoc genre, it would be better to try to squeeze something from them if that's doesn't cost a lot of resources.
Just wanted to be accurate, because my previous remark looks like assumption of second degree.

 

[StaticSpine]

Also I strongly advice to have Russian translation on Day 1 - not next week, let alone next month - you need it on Day 1.

Would you like to join our team?

 

[Fenix]

Well, I wanted to do that, and even wrote about it, but then reconsidered - don't want to spoil all pleasure.
I know its selfishnessm but I can't overcome myself.

 

[StaticSpine]

Well, I wanted to do that, and even wrote about it, but then reconsidered - don't want to spoil all pleasure.
I know its selfishnessm but I can't overcome myself.